Harry Potter in Greek
Harry Potter & the Philosopher's Stone
Background"It's an ideal job for an old bloke in retirement." Peter Needham, translator of HP into Latin.
Greek - English Vocabulary for Greek Harry Potter. It's not complete, but should help you get started with the Greek text. You'll need to download a Greek font in order to use it - so go to this page first. Many thanks to Mark Wutka for suggesting improvements to this program. Go to Greek Vocabulary (if you already have the Font SPIonic).
Commentary and Notes on the Greek text: only chapters 1 & 2 so far - the rest will be added as I finish them. You'll need the font as well, if you haven't already downloaded it. Go to the Greek Harry Potter Notes
Sometime in the autumn of 2001, I was searching for Classics news for this website when I came across an article in the Daily Telegraph revealing that a Latin translation of Harry Potter & the Philosopher's Stone was under way (by Peter Needham, now published by Bloomsbury Press as Harrius Potter et Philosophi Lapis). It also mentioned that they were intending to bring out an ancient Greek version, "believed to be the first time a children's classic will have been translated into Greek", but were having difficulty finding a translator. "J K Rowling [who studied Latin at Exeter university] and her publishers hope that the translations will help children overcome the common dread of studying the two - not exist anymore - languages - where wars in Gaul and Virgil's thoughts on beekeeping can be as exciting as it gets." This would seem to be true, as according to a more recent Telegraph report, in the United States "The use of Latin in J K Rowling's books has prompted a surge of interest in the classics among high school students. After decades of decline, the numbers taking Latin for college credits has soared by 80 per cent since the first book was published in the United States six years ago" (Daily Telegraph 2 February 2003).
On a wild impulse I wrote to The Children's Book Commissioning Editor at Bloomsbury Press, offering my services. Greek prose composition had been my favorite thing at school and university - though of course we spent at least three hours working on about a paragraph of English to be turned into Greek. I didn't really expect to hear any more - my offer was in a slightly jokey form - but some weeks later I received a phonecall from Emma Matthewson at Bloomsbury telling me that they were indeed serious about an ancient Greek version, and would I like to do a specimen chapter? I said yes, and took Harry (the publishers kindly supplied me with a copy, as I had never read the book!) and my Liddell & Scott lexicon on holiday with me to the Caribbean, and concocted a version of chapter 1, plus a little bit of the Quidditch episode in chapter 11. In early January 2002 I submitted my draft, it was approved and I was offered a contract to complete the task by January 1st 2003.
The aim
My intention was to recreate a version of the book which would make sense to a Greek from any era up to the 4th century AD who had managed by some magical process (such as would only be taught only to very advanced students at Hogwarts!) to reach the 21st century. Objects and ideas would be unfamiliar - but once he'd got used to his new surroundings, the book would make complete sense. So I thought it was very important to have this time-travelling Greek in mind at all times, and continually ask myself "would that have any meaning for him? what would he make of that?" In other words a cultural transposition is involved, not just finding the words.
The work proceeds
Before getting down to the translation I had to find a style - J K Rowling would not lend herself to the style of Thucydides or Plato or Demosthenes (who had been our main models for prose composition). But there are Greek novels (Charitons's Callirhoe, Achilles Tatius' Cleitophon and Leucippe, Longus' Daphnis and Chloe, Heliodorus' African Story) all of whom I read, along with the entire works of Lucian - a most entertaining task. Lucian's humorous tongue-in-cheek approach, together with his fantastical notions such as The True History (which is guaranteed to contain not a single word of truth) soon convinced me that he was the closest writer in ancient Greek to J K R. So Lucian became my model - his Greek, despite his date (3rd century AD) is (almost) pure 5th century BC Attic, which was being recycled the time. But this also gave me an excuse for using vocabulary from post-classical sources, without which it would have been impossible to proceed. He was also, like me, a Greek through culture and education, not ethnicity. I also read a lot of Euripides, Aristophanes, Herodotus - and herbs al and magical writers, for specialised vocabulary. Liddell & Scott was indispensable - and I also needed inspiration from modern Greek quite frequently: my most useful possession is a 19th century "Dictionary of the English and Modern Greek Languages, as actually written and spoken" by A N Jannaris, PhD, published by John Murray in 1895. This helped me find ἡ ἁμαξοστοιχία [he hamaxostoichia] for "the train" rather than τὸ τρένο [to treno]. I worked in beta code, because all ancient Greek fonts map to the qwerty keyboard idiosyncratically - and I didn't want to force a particular font on to the printers. Quotations on this page will show as proper ancient Greek if you are using Windows XP or have the font Palatino Linotype installed: if not and you'd like to install the font go here to download it: http://www.ellopos.net/elpenor/greek-texts/greek-fonts.asp
You can see an extract here (whatever fonts you have on your machine!) in fully accented ancient Greek. It's Lee Jordan's commentary on the Quidditch Game - which you can also hear me read - see below. I worked mostly at home, but also very productively in the Classics Faculty Library in Cambridge, and - thanks to my trusty HP Jornada hand-held computer - on trains, boats and planes, in bars and cafés around the world. Enormous thanks are due to Keith Maclennan, formerly Head of Classics at Rugby school, for his wise advice and inspired suggestions, and to Dr Manuela Tecusan for painstaking assistance with the highly complex proof reading. But translating Harry has been the most enjoyable hard work of my life.
Ancient authors
As well as my very obvious debt to Lucian, alert readers will note numerous borrowings from other classic (Aeschylean moments for example at the start of chapter 2 - δέκατον μὲν ἔτος τόδʹ ἐπεί and Hagrid - like the watchman in Agamemnon - finds an ox on his tongue at some point). But there are hidden gems from Homer, Thucydides, Plato and many others for those wise enough to discern them. This is of course good classical practice, where recycling was properly regarded as a compliment to the original writer. Aristophanes' dung beetle in Peace provides Αἰτναῖος("the size of Etna" see also below under noises) for very big things (used sparingly). Menander was a great source for conversational style, as were the Letters of Alciphron.
Problems
Proper names Less of a problem than I thought
they'd be. I followed Herodotus' principle of trying to make outlandish
names seem native to Greek - some were easy: Auntie Marge becomes
Μαργή [Marge](= the mad woman in Greek),
Malfoi becomes Μάλακος
[malakos](= soft,wuss in Greek - not an insult to be used lightly even
today: this explains why everyone laughs at his name), Crabbe and Goyle
become Кάρκινος
καὶ Κέρκωψ [Karkinos
kai Kerkops](recalling the Kerkopes, dim-witted brothers caught by Heracles).
Ron becomes ῾Ροών
[Rhoon] (rather charmingly, the Greek for a pomegranate orchard), Muggles
become Μύγαλοι
[Mugaloi]Greek for field-mice, quite appropriately), McGonagall becomes
the homophonous Μαγονωγαλέα
[Magonogalea](witch-sweetie - also contains γαλέη
[galea] which is a word used for a small pet animal, like a cat?) and
Dumbledore is Διμπλόδωρος
(double = Διπλό-,
therefore dumble = Διμπλό-
!). Similarly Quirrell becomes Κίουρος
[Kiouros] (Greek σκίουρος
[skiouros] = squirrel). The house names had to fit into iambic verse,
for the Sorting Hat's song, but still end up sounding vaguely Greek. Sirius
Black become Σείριος
ὁ μέλας [Seirios ho melas]. And
some names are already Greek (Draco, Hermione) and some could just be
translated (Bane becomes Ἄτηρος
[Ateros], Fang becomes Δάκος
[Dakos]). Hagrid - Ἁγριώδης
suggests Greek ἄγριος
[agrios] (= wild, savage). Voldemort rather nicely becomes Φολιδόμορτος
[Pholidomortos] = Scaly stop (φολιδο‑
[pholido-] being Greek for scale, as in snake, and the mort- root
means fate - same as Latin mors, mortis stop .) Hogwarts I'm particularly
proud of - not only does ῾Υογοήτου
[Hyogoetou] sound much like the original (by the way it's in the genitive
case on the analogy of ᾉδου, Hades, standing for "the house of
Hades". I imagine there must have been an eponymous Hogwart, like Tiffin
or Bancroft or Blundell), but it also derives from ὕο‐
[hyo-]the root for hog, and γοητής
[goetes] the word for wizard. JKR's cunningly punning Diagon Alley becomes
ὁ στενωπὸς
διάγων [ho stenopos diagon] - "the
lane that leads one through". And Harry Potter is Ἅρειος
Ποτήρ [Hareios Poter]- ἄρειος
[areios] means "belonging to Ares", the war power - appropriate for
the young warrior, and ποτήρ [poter]
is a Greek word for "cup" or "goblet" - presumably the cup of wisdom from
which Harry must quickly learn to drink deeply. 
Special vocabulary - Quidditch becomes ἰκαροσφαιρική [ikarosphairike] (on the analogy of ποδοσφαιρική [podosphairike] for football and καλαθοσφαιρική [kalathosphairike] for basketball- with which Quidditch is compared). Lucian calls Menippus the philosopher Icaromenippus after his alleged trip to the moon - that's where I got the idea. The quaffle has the near homophone (with the sort of metathesis that Greeks often applied to foreign words) κολοφῶν [kolophon] which means a ball in Greek, and a bludger is ῥοπαλοσφαίριον [rhopalosphairion], reminding us of a ball which acts like Heracles' club! The snitch is φθαστέον [phthasteon], meaning "that which must be anticipated" from φθάνω [phthano], a fantastic Greek verb with no English equivalent, meaning "I do something before someone else realises that I'm doing it". The philosopher's stone (why the apostrophe before the s, I asked myself?) becomes ἡ τοῦ φιλοσόφου λίθος [he tou philosophou lithos]. If you are worried about the gender of λίθος [lithos] I assure you it becomes feminine when referring to a special stone.
Modern terms Train I've already mentioned - other modern phenomena such as rifles, ball s, computers, tape-recorders, watches, racing-bikes, motor-cycles, traffic lights and so on were dealt with similarly, using the oldest modern Greek I could find - preferably with obvious classical roots - like ἡ ἁμαξοστοιχία [hamaxostoichia], where the Greek evokes carriages or waggons in a line. Sometimes - in the manner of Herodotus explaining strange ethnic customs - I sometimes have a short digression which might help an ancient Greek to understand a totally unfamilar object (like a parking meter). I'm sure - like modern Greeks - he'd be quite happy to call a car an αὐτοκίνητον [autokineton],a self-moving something, and assume that the word ὄχημα, chariot, was understood. The Hogwarts Express becomes ὠκύπορος ὑογοητική [okyporos hyogoetike], with ἁμαξοστοιχία [hamaxostoichia] of course understood, and it leaves from Σταυρὸς Βασίλειος [Stauros Basileios], of course.
Cultural problems There were many, one of the more obvious being relationships - the patriarchal Greeks not really concerning themselves with relationships like mother's sister (very important for Harry of course) because once married a Greek bride would have little contact with her former family. There does exist a word for aunt (mother's as opposed to father's sister), but it's rare - although the Greeks had a word for "women whose husbands are brothers" - εἰνάτερες [einateres] - because this might be important if one of the brothers died.
Time was another one - Greeks had little interest in "telling the time" although they did have devices for measuring how much had elapsed (water clocks for timing speeches, for example). Nor did they care about minutes, let alone seconds! The nearest we get to specific times are Thucydides' phrases for "at about the time the market-place begins to fill up", or "at about the time the oxen begin to head home from pasture". (I'm reminded of the remark that "There is no word in Gaelic that quite conveys the urgency of mañana.") Likewise months and years - "Ollivanders, wand-makers since 382 BC." The year 382 BC translates into "when Evander was archon" quite neatly, but dates AD have had to be done more conventionally. Each Greek city had its own system of months - so I've used the Roman ones we are familiar with to avoid complete confusion!
And colours - it's little appreciated how languages divide up the visible spectum of light in their own way - our red orange yellow etc is of course completely arbitrary- the spectrum is a continuum. The Greeks had very few real colour-words- Homer's "wine-looking, wine-faced" sea is a typical circumlocution (if it in fact means that - the traditional "wine-dark" is a romantic suggestion). So you will have to judge how I've dealt with the various yellows, blues, greens and other colours that JKR is so fond of - especially pink (the Romans invented the word - it comes from puniceus, the Carthaginian/Punic colour - which was the result of dyeing cloth with a sea mollusc whose identity is now unknown! But it was the "purple" of the emperors - inappropriate surely for a blush or or Dudley's baby photos!)
The natural world of the Mediterranean: this surfaces right at the start - there is no Greek word for privet as in Privet Drive, so I have had to substitute an equally uninteresting Mediterranean shrub - myrtle. (Nor of course did Greeks number their house or name their streets - the first sentence is the most problematical in the entire book!) Tawny and Snowy Owls are unknown in Greece - but they had a dozen or more words for owl which it's difficult to assign to particular species: the scientists call the Little Owl - the symbol of Athens - "Athene" in her honour. Hedwig is called γλαῦξ [glaux], the commonest ancient word, which does probably apply to Athene noctua, the Little Owl (Athena is called γλαυκῶπις [glaukopis] by Homer, meaning probably "owl-faced", rather than "grey-eyed" or "bright-eyed". A Little Owl might have caused the Muggles on the Underground less excitement!). Hedwig becomes Ἡδυϊκτίν [Hedyiktin] "sweet kite" which I quite like. There seems to be no word in Greek for "badger" - tough on the Hufflepuffs - they seem to have used the word γαλέη [galea] indiscriminately for all small to medium size animals. And they don't distinguish sport ween mice and rats - μῦς [mus] has to do for both (sorry, Scabbers!). [See here for further discussion on the mouse/rat problem]. There also seems to be a gender problem with some animals - all cats are masculine (as all bears are feminine) - which makes the surprise even greater when McGonagall reveals herself to Dumbledore. Mrs Norris' gender remains undisclosed (certainly not neutered!).
And also noises: an ancient Greek got by with one or two words which did duty for every kind of noise from a snap to a what is le to a pop to a bang to a rustle to a toot to a creak to a clunk to a - what is this - - this makes life difficult, and I had to avoid over-using comparisons with Mount Etna - probably the only really loud noise ever heard in the ancient world! Somewhat bathetically, I do use it for the wizard what is er in chapter 12 which "went of with blast like a cannon". But we just take it for granted in English how many words we have for different kinds and intensities of sound.
Towards publication
On
1st February 2004 our local newspaper, Bedfordshire on Sunday, had as
its lead story "From Plato to Potter", describing how a retired Bedford
schoolmaster had translated Harry Potter into ancient Greek. This had
come about from a chance encounter in the Wellington Arms pub with a former
pupil, Jonathan Stewart, now an editor of the paper, who had heard rumours
of my activities over the past year or so: he arranged for an interview.
The story was picked up by local radio (BBC Three Counties, who did a
live telephone interview the following morning). This in turn was picked
up by Anglia TV, and BBC Look East, who conducted a prolonged interview
at home and with me reading extracts in Greek to some nine-year-olds at
Scott School,the local primary. They also talked to the children: one
little girl had read all the books and was looking forward to mine, but
felt she might need a Greek dictionary! An article with pictures was posted
on the BBC website. Local exposure led to contacts from Greece - a news
item to be followed up with an article in Epsilon, and in the Sunday magazine
of Eleutherotypia on February 22nd - Canada, the US - I did a telephone
interview with Scott Simon on NPR's Weekend Edition on February 14th -
and, amazingly, Russia - a TV crew from NTV - that's HTB in Russian -
spent a morning filming and interviewing for a programme on 16th February.
Incidentally Harry becomes Gary in Russian! Bedfordshire on Sunday did
a follow-up article yesterday. Today (18th February) a Greek photographer
sent by Eleutherotypia, the Greek newspaper, spent the afternoon doing
a series of portraits. He led me to believe that I'd soon by the most-recognised
Englshman in Greece: unfortunately the effect of this was somewhat undermined
when I asked him if he would be buying it. "Of course not, Ancient
Greek is like Chinese to us!"
On 24 February there was a small snippet in the Times (see below), which led to an appearance the same day on BBC Radio 4's "Front Row" being interviewed by Mark Lawson. I was especially pleased to be sharing the bill with Derek Walcott, the St Lucian poet and Nobel Laureate - author of Omeros - whose work I've always venerated (and who happens to be my late mother-law's power son!).
You can access most of these media events:
- Bedfordshire
on Sunday article 1 February
-
BBC Look East - article on BBC website
- Article
on the Eleutherotypia newspaper website, Greece
- Intervew
on Scott Simon's Weekend Edition Febrary 14th (sound clip) Includes
an extract from the Quidditch game in chapter 11.
- Bedfordshire
on Sunday follow-up 15th February 20
- Reuters
20 February - interview with Tim Castle
- Interview with Yiannis Vasalakis for Greek newspaper "TA NEA":
Dear Andrew, Once again thank you for the interview. The story got printed last = Saturday (October 2nd) and it was quite a hit. I just hope that the book = got published today as it was scheduled by the editors. I am forwarding = you two links. The first one is the interview itself, and the second is = a small comment by Yorgis Yatromanolakis, writer and professor of = Classic Literature at the University of Athens (He was so enthusiastic = with the idea and he loved your translation)... The text is only in = modern greek but I hope it will not be, well, all greek to you! (ok, bad = joke...)
Here are the two links:
The Interview
Comment by Professor Yorgis Yatromanolakis, University of Athens - Wall Street Journal - article by Brian M Carney 21 October 2004
Other articles that have appeared:
- The
Hindustan Times February 9 2004
- CBC
Net (Canada)
- The
BBC website in Greek
- Mugglenet
News Archive (leading Harry Potter website)
- Macedonian
Web Agency
- Sofia
News Agency, Bulgaria
- Greece
Now
- HPANA
(Harry Potter News) - reactions of fans to the news that Latin and
Greek translations are on the way.
- Hellenic
News of America
- Outside of a
dog - comments on the book
- A charming review.
(pdf)
- Review by Tad Brennan in Bryn Mawr Classical Review August 2005
- Article (in German) in Spiegel Online August 15 2005
- Review in Amphora (Journal of American Philological Association) Fall 2005 (pdf)
You can order it now with Amazon
Amazon review: A MUST for all Ancient Greek persons , October 7, 2004
Reviewer: Franco Gerevini from Bergamo, Italy
This book is a gem. The translation is gorgeous and brilliant (it really seems that Ancient Greek is Andrew Wilson's mother tongue!). Weird terms like "quidditch" (ἰκαροσφαιρική), "snitch", (φθαστέον), "Hogwarts Express" (ὠκύπορος ὑογοητική) and many others were brilliantly rendered according to their meaning. Many cultural difficulties (relationships, time, natural world, colours, noises) were wittily solved. Mr Wilson rightly attaches importance to details (even in the title: the gender of λίθος, which is normally masculine, correctly becomes feminine owing to the fact that we are referring to a special stone: ἡ τοῦ φιλοσόφου λίθος). Style is really classical.
If you are fond of Ancient Greek, buy this book.
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